On Thu, Aug 25, 2016 at 6:45 AM Udhay Shankar N <[email protected]> wrote:
> Inspired by my friend Javeeth's book release, I am starting this thread > early this year (edited the subject line accordingly). > > http://www.amazon.in/Conversations-Chaos-Javeeth/dp/1945688653 > Added to my wish list. The year 2016 has been not very prolific in terms of reading books so far. I was hoping to squeeze a few more in the remaining 3 months. Among the books I have read so far, I heartily recommend the following: 1. Modern Romance <https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143109251/>, Aziz Ansari and Eric Kleinenberg. A good mix of sociology, anthropology and humor looking at how people find their significant others in the world of snapchat and tinder. 2. Gratitude <https://www.amazon.com/dp/0451492935/>, Oliver Sachs. A short (I read it cover to cover in a day) collection of some of the essays on death and dying that Oliver Sachs wrote in his last days. The essays are available online if you don't want to buy the book. Sachs was such a great wielder of the pen. So much curiosity, humanity and joy in his writing. 3. Ancestral Passions: The Leakey Family and the Quest for Humankind's Beginnings <https://www.amazon.com/dp/0684801922>, Virginia Morell. Not really a new book, but I only got to it this year. An entertaining look at the lives and the paleo-anthropological discoveries of the Leakeys of Kenya. Not just a good biography, but also excellent on the science (though there have been further developments since the book was published). 4. Kenya: A Natural History <https://www.amazon.com/dp/1408134713/>, Steve Spawls and Glenn Mathews; Birds of Kenya and Northern Tanzania <https://www.amazon.com/dp/0691010226/>, Zimmerman et. al.; The Kingdon Field Guide to African Mammals <https://www.amazon.com/dp/0691164533/>, Jonathan Kingdon. I am recommending these 3 reference books that, by their nature, are to be read slowly and piecemea and not cover to coverl. I recently went back for a trip to Kenya and these three books were my constant companion when I was out on Safari. The field guides on the mammals and birds are excellent reference works which I would pour over when I returned to my campsite after a game drive. Trying to identify the creatures I saw and learning more about their status, behavior, etc. The Natural History book (cheaper to buy in Kenya than abroad) is simply outstanding! It is a very accessible book written with humor about the geology, paleontology, anthropology, linguistics, sociology and ecology of what is modern Kenya. I wish somebody would write an equivalent book about the natural history of India. I would love to read how the Indian subcontinent came about geologically. How the Deccan traps were formed, how the Himalayas were formed, how the rivers were formed, what we know of the first waves of hominins, what we know of the migration of modern humans into the region, how the languages came about, how the flora and fauna came to live here, etc. Thaths
